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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/29200713">This Is Home</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyanmaluvbot/pseuds/kyanmaluvbot'>kyanmaluvbot</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Haikyuu!!</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Comfort No Hurt, Fluff, Found Family, Trans Nishinoya Yuu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-02-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-02-04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 04:55:32</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,020</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/29200713</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyanmaluvbot/pseuds/kyanmaluvbot</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Who knew scrolling through Instagram could lead to an identity crisis?</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nishinoya Yuu &amp; Tanaka Ryuunosuke, Nishinoya Yuu &amp; Tanaka Saeko</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>38</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>This Is Home</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It all started the summer after his first year of middle school. He was bored, as per usual when he wasn’t doing anything. He’d been scrolling through Instagram for hours and wandered to the depths of his explore page.</p>
<p>He knew he was bisexual, that’d been something he’d figured out when he was younger. He was almost out to nearly everyone and had accepted it. Right now he was very very deep rabbit-hole of lgbtq+ posts.</p>
<p>He found them educational and interesting, reading the informative captions with a kind of excitement he hadn’t been feeling much the past few days. He loved learning about every new identity and experience.</p>
<p>Then he came upon a particular post. It was a post about someone’s experience being transgender female-to-male. He’d seen a few posts about the topic but this one had a much longer caption.</p>
<p>He sat there for 2 whole minutes reading and rereading it. Something about this person’s story seemed strangely… familiar. He related a lot to it.</p>
<p>Wait.</p>
<p>No, no, it couldn’t be. This was a coincidence. It must’ve just been an overlap, a universal lgbt experience… yeah… He swallowed a lump in his throat.</p>
<p>He wanted to ignore it, he really did. But something in him made him click on the #transftm tag. He led himself deeper into the rabbithole.</p>
<p>4 hours later. 5am. He was beginning to feel quite groggy, but couldn’t bring himself to go to sleep. He was extremely focused on the words covering the screen in front of him.</p>
<p>He’d absorbed a lot of information in the past 4 hours. His brain felt like it was going to explode. However, at the same time, something was becoming increasingly clear to him.</p>
<p>“I’m not a girl.” It was barely a whisper, gliding through the dark, humid room. It felt weird to say aloud. Wrong, but in the most right way. It felt freeing. He knew deep down that it was true. But what the hell was he supposed to do about it now?</p>
<p>His family situation wasn’t exactly the best. He spent most of his time holed up in his room playing video games or outside playing volleyball. He tried to keep himself busy at all times. He couldn’t go to his family about this. He didn’t feel comfortable.</p>
<p>He sighed, running his hand through his shoulder-length hair. He’d always hated his hair, come to think of it. He didn’t know why, it was just too long for his taste. He slapped his hand over his face.<br/>“The more you think about it, the more you’ll think it’s true. Just go to bed.” His quiet words seemed to echo through his bedroom. He finally put his phone up and, though it was hard to calm his mind down, went to sleep.</p>
<p>He woke up the next day and immediately went to Tanaka’s house. He needed to distract himself in any way possible.</p>
<p>It didn’t help.</p>
<p>He’d always been jealous of Tanaka. For what, he didn’t know. He just envied the way he could be so carefree and outgoing all the time, throwing his shirt off at every opportunity.</p>
<p>Now, Nishinoya finally understood why he was jealous of Tanaka. His flat chest, deeper voice, shaved head. Everything about him oozed masculine energy. Noya wanted that. He wanted it so bad.</p>
<p>This was not helping his crisis. He couldn’t stop noticing the small things about Tanaka that made him come off as a boy. He took up more space, his jawline was sharper, his eyebrows thicker. Some of the things Noya noticed he did too, and at that realization he got a strange sense of euphoria in his chest.</p>
<p>The idea that he might be a boy lingered in his head for weeks. He started noticing things about himself that he never particularly liked and realizing they were all stereotypically feminine features.</p>
<p>The thought of being trans was slightly comforting, but also scary. What if he was faking it? What if he came out and regretted it? What if, what if, what if.</p>
<p>One day, while at Tanaka’s, those contradicting thoughts were being especially loud. He was having a hard time being his normal self, and his best friend didn’t fail to notice.</p>
<p>“Hey, dude, what’s wrong? You’ve been, like, all fidgety today.” Tanaka may be scatterbrained sometimes, but he’s surprisingly observant when it comes to other people’s emotions. Nishinoya opened his mouth to say he was fine, but the words didn’t come out. He couldn’t keep lying to his best friend, to everyone, to himself.</p>
<p>Should he tell Tanaka? Saeko and him were almost like a second family to him. They were closer than his actual family. They were accepting of him being bi, and saeko was bi herself. Realistically, they would accept him immediately. The only thing stopping him was his own fear.</p>
<p>His grandfather taught him to be brave. He had to be, especially right now. He knew he couldn’t keep it bottled up forever.</p>
<p>Tanaka gestured with his hand, urging Noya to speak. He realized he’d been silent for at least a minute or two. He snapped his mouth shut and took a deep breath, closing his eyes.</p>
<p>When he opened them, tears escaped and began streaming down his face. His best friend’s eyes widened and he stuttered a bit, not sure if he should say anything. He settled on reaching out and wrapping his arms around Noya, squeezing him tight.</p>
<p>Noya sobbed into Tanaka’s shoulder and clung to him. He held on tight to the back of his shirt and buried his face in his neck. The taller boy hummed and rocked them slowly side to side, rubbing Noya’s back.</p>
<p>After a few minutes, he calmed down enough to speak. He was so nervous he felt like he was going to throw up. Tanaka gently leaned away from him to set his hands on his shoulders. He looked him in the eyes and said, “Tell me bro, what’s wrong?”</p>
<p>Being called “bro” made Nishinoya’s heart skip a beat and gave him that small burst of confidence he needed. He gulped and looked down, silent tears still streaming down his face.</p>
<p>“I… I think I’m a boy…” He squeezed his eyes shut and tucked his chin down to his chest. It was silent for a minute or two. His heart felt like it was going to beat out of his chest. He started to regret telling him.</p>
<p>“You’re a boy?” Tanaka’s voice didn’t sound judgemental or disgusted at all, but he was still scared to get his hopes up. He slowly opened his eyes and looked up at his best friend. His best friend who, to his surprise, was grinning.</p>
<p>Tanaka made an awed “o” sound. “Bro, that’s so cool! Have you told anyone else? Do you have a new name or something?”</p>
<p>Noya stared at him, wide eyed and open mouthed. Then, slowly, he started to laugh. He had a huge, goofy grin on his face. He brought his friend in closer for another hug. Tanaka squeezed him tightly and they laughed together.</p>
<p>Nishinoya cleared his throat and responded to the taller boy’s questions. “One, no I haven’t. Two… well I never really thought about that. I guess I do want a new name.” He frowned. “But I don’t even know where to start.”</p>
<p>Tanaka made a “hmm” sound and then snapped his fingers. “The internet!” He scrambled to grab his laptop from off his desk and set it on the ground between them. He googled “Japanese baby names for boys” and they began their search.</p>
<p>Turns out naming yourself is a lot harder to do than one may think. They sat there for hours, scrolling through baby name websites and writing down any they thought were interesting. Then, they’d test them out. None seemed to fit. Luckily, they were both energetic and determined. They weren’t going to give up.</p>
<p>Saeko came in at about 2am. She raised one eyebrow and looked down at the two boys laying on the floor. “Okay, something’s up.” The two of them looked up at her, confused.</p>
<p>“I’m used to you guys being up late, but you’re being too quiet. It’s suspicious.”</p>
<p>Nishinoya and Ryu stared at each other, not sure what to say. Ryu's eyes were wide, as if asking, “Can she know?” Noya gave a quick nod and they looked back up at her. Now she was the one confused, tilting her head.</p>
<p>Noya began. “I… uh… I’m… I’m a boy…” His voice was quiet but audible. It took Saeko a minute to process what he said, but when they did they gave a large grin much like Ryu's from earlier. “You’re trans? Me too! That’s so cool!”</p>
<p>They stared at her before Ryu spoke. “What?!” She perked up and giggled. “Oh yeah, it’s not that big of a deal. I’m non-binary, I use she/they pronouns.”</p>
<p>Tanaka made some indistinguishable sounds and waved his hands between Saeko and Nishinoya. He wasn't opposed to it or anything, he was just surprised that was the first time he was hearing of this. Saeko smiled and put their hand on their brother's shoulder.</p>
<p>"Sorry I didn't tell you, bro. I never really got the chance to, and I'm alright with she/her so I kept putting it off." Ryu shook his head. "It's fine, now I know!"</p>
<p>He grinned and Saeko playfully punched him on the shoulder before turning to the other boy.</p>
<p>"So, what's the issue?" He waved towards the laptop, still open on a baby name page.</p>
<p>"We can't find a name that fits." Saeko hummed and sat down in between the two boys and scrolled on the laptop. After a few minutes she frowned.</p>
<p>"You're right, nothing really fits him." They rubbed their face and groaned.</p>
<p>"Hmm… is there anyone you look up to? Like a YouTuber, celebrity, anything? Or maybe a name you've always thought might be cool to have?"</p>
<p>He thought about it for a bit. "Well, there is this one volleyball player… he's not very well known but his name is pretty cool." He began fidgeting with his fingers and looked down at his lap.</p>
<p>"Perfect! What's his name?" He got out his phone and quickly pulled up the stats page for the player. Ryu and Saeko leaned in a bit to read it.</p>
<p>"Nishinoya! That's perfect, dude!" Ryu gave a wide grin and Saeko nodded. She gave Noya a side hug. "You can try it out and if it doesn't work you can always change it!"</p>
<p>Nishinoya nodded and smiled, leaning into their hug. When they separated, he went to brush his hair out of his face and then hesitated.</p>
<p>"There is one more thing… my hair." Saeko nodded, looking at his shoulder-length hair that had been the bane of his existence for the past few weeks. "Have you told your parents?" she asked.</p>
<p>He shook his head. "I don't- they won't like it." She frowned and then nodded. Tanaka chimed in.</p>
<p>"They don't have to like it, we'll just make them deal with it!" Noya laughed a bit despite his nerves. His parents definitely wouldn't be happy, but maybe with Ryu and Saeko, he could do this. He could make it so they couldn't ignore it.</p>
<p>Saeko lifted up a strand of his hair. "I have the intense urge to cut your hair off myself, but I think I'll just make an appointment for you instead." She laughed and pulled out her phone to set a reminder.</p>
<p>They held the phone up. "Tomorrow, and I'll get you in as soon as possible." Noya smiled and leaned forward, hugging them tightly. "Thank you, big sis."</p>
<p>She smiled fondly. "It's no problem, bro. We'll go clothes shopping, too." They sat there, hugging each other for a moment.</p>
<p>"Hey, no fair! Let me in on the hug!" Ryu grumbled. Saeko and Nishinoya giggled and both opened one arm to let him into the embrace.</p>
<p>They simply sat there for a bit, comfortable in each other's arms. Things would be hard, but he's got the best not-family in the world to help him.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>NOTE: I write solely for fun so please refrain from leaving constructive criticism ^.^</p>
<p>AHHHHH I've been so excited for this. This is basically a comfort fic for myself; it's what I wish I could've had coming out. I'm a huge sucker for found family, and I love Nishinoya's dynamic with the Tanaka siblings. It's not my best work, but I hope you enjoyed!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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